Ten years of ocean science and conservation online.

david shiffman

David Shiffman remains in the lead for the 2011 Blogging Scholarship, but there’s been a shake-up over the last few days and a new challenger is climbing the ranks. Let’s make sure this upstart doesn’t climb much higher.

David after his first semester exams, eight years ago. Also, what I imagine he looks like after seeing the weekend shake-up.

There are many faiths in the world, but the one truest and purest is David Shiffman’s faith in me. Yes, that is a shrine to the Southern Fried Scientist that David is kneeling before. The offering appears to be of the magnetic marine creature variety. I too am filled with faith, faith that our own David Shiffman is still in the lead. And faith in our readers to keep voting for him so that it will stay that way.

I extracted this picture from David Shiffman’s Facebook page, so I really don’t have any context for you. Please post your own captions and backstory in the comment thread. And don’t forget to Vote for David!

You see, I’ve know David for a long time. We were college roommates, a ground-breaking (pun intended) rock climbing team, dive buddies; we’ve co-authored papers together, coordinated local, national, and international marine education campaigns, and co-blogged (along with the incomparable Amy Freitag) at Southern Fried Science for what will soon be our 3rd year; I’ve spent hours training him to correctly use a well-placed semi-colon for comedic effect. Which is a long way of saying I have many, many embarrassing pictures of David Shiffman that I’m almost certain should never see the light of day.

So here’s the deal. David is currently in the lead. We want it to stay that way. We want you to want it to stay that way. For every day that David is in first place, I will free a picture from the archives, in increasing increments of hilarity. If he wins… well, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Freshman year David wore this Star Trek costume more than is healthy. Seriously, I've got like 40 pictures of him dressed like this, and they're all from different events. The real question though: If he's such a Star Trek fan, why is he a red shirt?

If you’ve never been to Southern Fried Science before and want to get an idea of who this Shiffman bloke is and what he’s about (hint: it has something to do with sharks), check out his two bench-mark posts:

At the 2nd International Marine Conservation Congress, Dr. Nick Dulvy and the IUCN Shark Specialist Group organized a special symposium called “Securing the Conservation of Sharks and Rays”. This symposium featured leading scientists, international policy experts, the founder of a creative non-profit, a National Geographic conservation photographer… and me. It was, without a doubt, the greatest professional honor of my (admittedly brief so far) career.

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